The National Collegiate Athletic Association, the governing body for major college athletics, filed a lawsuit today against Gov. Tom Corbett and other state officials saying they are illegally attempting to interfere with a sanctions agreement between the organization and Penn State.
Read the lawsuit HERE
The state legislature has considered imposing a law requiring the NCAA to spend the $60 million in fines against Penn State only within Pennsylvania and the creation of a state-controlled endowment for the distribution of fine proceeds.
Those actions, the NCAA lawsuit said, would violate the U.S. Constitution. They would disrupt interstate commerce by attempting to legislate where private parties spend their money and by confiscating funds intended for the victims of child sexual abuse nationwide to be used solely for the benefit of Pennsylvania residents, at the direction of Pennsylvania officials, the lawsuit said.
Corbett sued the NCAA last month and asked a federal judge to promptly overturn penalties imposed on Penn State in the wake of a child-sex abuse cover-up at the university.
Corbett said the sanctions - including the fines, a four-season bowl ban and the elimination of 20 football scholarships - "are an attack on past, present and future students of Penn State, the citizens of our commonwealth and our economy."
The NCAA is fighting Corbett's lawsuit separately and did not raise it as an issue in the action filed today in U.S. District Court.